NEWSLETTER
The 2011 Peoria Chiefs were not a very good baseball team, and based in part on that I did not expect much from Daytona in 2012. Unfortunately, I was apparently right. The Cubs’ High A franchise finished the year with an overall record of 58-74, the second worst in the league.
Surprisingly, however, the Cubs stacked up fairly well against the rest of the league in several key categories. They were right at the league average in terms of average age, so we can essentially dismiss that as being a significant factor for or against the Cubs. Their team OPS of .712 was good enough to finish fifth in the twelve team league, and their team WHIP of 1.354 ranked seventh.
So, if the Cubs were league average in age and ranked in the middle of the pack in both pitching and hitting, how did they finish near the bottom? In short, I don’t know. Their 64 home runs ranked next to last in the league (although their .381 SLG ranked fourth), but their league leading 201 steals and 50 triples should have largely offset that. And the Cubs were fourth in the league in terms of runs per game with 4.54. The pitching did allow 4.55 runs per game (ninth in the league), but even that should have resulted in a winning percentage close to .500. In fact, if we do the math for Daytona’s Pythagorean Winning Percentage based their 599 runs scored and 600 runs allowed we find they should have finished with a winning percentage of .499. That would have left the Cubs ranked sixth in the league, not next to last.
I think we can blame some of the Cubs’ struggles on the weather; they played in a lot of doubleheaders this season, and they had a lot of long breaks due to consecutive rain outs. That is not something any team will handle easily. Toss in a dose of bad luck and a sprinkling of bad defense (third most errors in the league), and I think we can make some guesses about what happened to those missing wins. Still, this team performed better than their final record showed. Despite anemic number in the wins column, Daytona actually had a decent year.
Scores From Yesterday
Tennessee – This game was tied at three at the end of the seventh, and it stayed tied at three until the top of the 15th. The Smokies won the marathon by a final of 7-3.
Daytona – Daytona wrapped up their season with a 3-2 home win.
Peoria – The Chiefs’ scored first but ultimately lost in ten innings by a final of 5-4.
Boise – Boise had Sunday off. They open the 2012 playoffs today at home against Yakima.
Performances of the Day
Other Minor League Notes
